Tings are collapsing in the final volume of Pullman's latest trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from states, and accumulating in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his place in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are faltering and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that animates this final volume, which resumes where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, the author's last foray into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating world he first introduced in the distant past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of the real world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the skies are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but below, vehicles are ridden and drinks is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still recognisably the prickly and persistent heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more careful, less certain. This restraint is intensified by her division from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an trait which he symbolizes as her "imagination"), and her mission to reunite with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with wonder and danger on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in play, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and the author's brilliantly sinister incarnation of strict, bureaucratic malice – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of head of the church's governing body, and is set on using his newfound authority to broaden the church's control. Another protagonist, who carried infant Lyra to refuge along a swollen river as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in espionage: he is dispatched to the city to learn more about Delamare's intentions. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the rare and valuable rose oil which appears in some way to be the origin of a social and economic crisis spreading out from the region. The extract is seen by some as a tradeable product, by different parties as a empirical or spiritual wonder, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be removed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
Similar to His Dark Materials, our protagonist's actions, and her fate, are shown to be inextricably connected with the fate of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they merge. As in the first trilogy, her movements and her fate are shown to be deeply entwined with the future of the world. Her individual quest to reconnect with her soul and regain her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a larger battle with an controlling system which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to stifle freedom of reason, creativity and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which people can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The novel starts with the discovery of a collection of unusual fissures in the fabric of the Earth's sky: gateways that appear to open into alternate realities. One such opening seems to be the origin of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, designates these portals as a threat to the church's beliefs and sets out to destroy them. As the heroine begins to turn away from strict reason and revert to feeling, nevertheless, her certainty that these sites must be protected – that their significance and what they offer is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a Blakean conflict between purity and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
